Kendall disappoints me. He is old enough to remember the blacklist and the rush for, what was then, political correctness. Don Imus should not have lost his job any more than Zero Mostel, Abner Biberman, Dalton Trumbo and the rest should have lost theirs. If America is the land of free speech, it must be the land of free and foolish speech. Don Imus' audience, apparently, like his style of "humor" and, if some of the postings on this thread are to be believed, they are not all sheet wearing yahoos. (I wouldn't know. I am. neither, amused or edified by shock jockery. I find the practice of calling women "ho's" degrading but I found it, no less, degrading when Snoop Doggy did it). Kendall, among others, seems to have a different standard of acceptable behavior based on skin color.
I, really, shouldn't be singling out Kendall. He is, no more, predictable, in this regard, than the majority of posters I think it comes with the genre. The folk scene, in America, at least, has been, for years, mostly white and leftist. As I am white and leftist, I have felt, very much, "at home". It is comforting to be around people who think like you (and it is, socially, easier to be around people who look like you.)
I am not preaching from the bleachers. I understand why the black community would be up in arms. It was their ox. I understand them because, I have that reaction when I hear a joke about Jews, told by a non-Jew. It is a reaction that exposes my vulnerability, my insecurity. Perhaps, I should get over it. Perhaps, we, all, should.